Primary menu

Post navigation

So what is this Something?

I haven’t had any updates in awhile because I have been looking at different blogging software. simpleblog, while easy to implement and customize, lacks features common to other solutions that I would like. So several months ago I began trying different programs in a test site, but none of them ultimately worked for me. Among the ones I tried:

dBlog – This offered some features I have been looking for, but the default locale is Italian. There is a translation for English which changes titles and headers, but things like the calendar remain in Italian. There isn’t a lot of documentation in English, so I was left to doing a lot of manual code search-and-replace.

DotNetNuke – This is one of the primo open-source CMS solutions available. It is an immensely powerful application that uses modules to offer the features you want: blog, document library, file library, ecommerce, forums, feeback, etc. The application is geared for more commercial or multi-user sites, not a one-off blog, so the portal is a bit too much for what I am looking for.

Nukedit – A solution ready to go pretty much right out of the box. But it lacks some of the features that even simpleblog offers.

WordPress – Probably the most popular blog software out there. But it uses PHP and mySQL, whereas I prefer ASP and Access since I know how to write in VBScript. I installed PHP and mySQL and tried to get WordPress working, but ultimately could not.

I have been using simpleblog 2.3 for awhile, and 2.2 before that. Version 3 is available and after looking at it before all the others, I decided to look at it again. It has the advantage that I am already familiar with the code that Johann has used for 2.x. While it still lacks the features I have been looking for, I grew tired of trying all the other solutions. So I have upgraded sidefumbling to simpleblog 3.0.

Pros:

Very simple installation using ASP with VBScript and an MSAccess database.

Built-in RSS feed.

Version 3 adds a sidebar for recent posts.

Version 3 uses FCKeditor for creating posts, which is a customizable WYSIWYG editor.

Easy to integrate it into your site by editing ASP files and including your own scripts.

Use of CSS for easy manipulation of global settings for font, layout, etc.

Cons:

No use of categories or the ability to group/search for posts based on keywords.

No search engine.

No notification of pending comments.

No use of CAPTCHA for comment spam-prevention.

Difficult to use code blocks for using literal code in posts, though I have figured out in FCKeditor how to do this.

Admin interface is limited to accessing previous posts by using calendar to access posts written on specific date, i.e., you cannot just browse a list of your posts for the one you one; you have to use the calendar to find the day you want and then bring up any posts for that single day only.

Cross-browser support is limited, mostly by layout issues.

No built-in way for posting from a mobile device, which is nice when traveling or making posts while at a conference, etc.

Not regularly updated.

Despite the cons, I offer my thanks to Johann for creating a free solution that has obviously worked for me.